The Moonspinners (4 page)

‘But—' I began, then paused. This was perhaps not the moment to tell them that I was quite well aware that there was no road from the east. The only road came in from the west, and then turned northwards over a pass which led it back inland. This spur of the White Mountains was served only by its tracks.

I saw the Greek watching me, and added, quickly: ‘I started at about midday, but it wouldn't take so long going back, of course, downhill.'

The man on the bed shifted irritably, as if his arm hurt him. ‘The village . . . Where are you staying?'

‘The hotel. There's only one; the village is very small. But I haven't been there yet. I only arrived at noon; I got a lift out from Heraklion, and I'm not expected, so I – I came up here for a walk, just on impulse. It was so lovely—'

I stopped. He had shut his eyes. The gesture excluded me, but it wasn't this that stopped me in mid-sentence. It was the sharp impression that he had not so much shut me out, as shut himself in, with something that went intolerably far beyond whatever pain he was feeling.

I got my second impulse of the day. Frances had often told me that one day my impulses would land me in serious trouble. Well, people like to be proved right sometimes.

I turned sharply, threw the crushed and wilted orchids out into the sunlight, and went across to the bed. Lambis moved as swiftly, thrusting out an arm to stop me, but when I pushed it aside he gave way. I dropped on one knee beside the wounded man.

‘Look—' I spoke crisply – ‘you've been hurt, and you're ill. That's plain enough. Now, I've no desire to push my way into what doesn't concern me; it's obvious you don't want questions asked, and you needn't tell me a single thing; I don't want to know. But you're sick, and if you ask me, Lambis is making a rotten job of looking after you, and if you don't watch your step, you're going to be very seriously ill indeed, if not downright dead. For one thing, that bandage is dirty, and for another—'

‘It's all right.' He was speaking, still with closed eyes, to the wall. ‘Don't worry about me. I've just got a touch of fever . . . be all right soon. You just . . . keep out of it, that's all. Lambis should never have . . . oh well, never mind. But don't worry about me. Get down now to your hotel and forget this . . . please.' He turned then, and peered at me as if painfully, against the light. ‘For your own sake. I mean it.' His good hand moved, and I put mine down to meet it. His fingers closed over mine: the skin felt dry and hot, and curiously dead. ‘But if you do see anyone on your way down . . . or in the village, who—'

Lambis said roughly, in Greek: ‘She says she has not been to the village yet; she has seen no one. What's the use of asking? Let her go, and pray she does keep quiet. Women all have tongues like magpies. Say no more.'

The Englishman hardly seemed to hear him. I thought that the Greek words hadn't penetrated. His eyes never left me, but his mouth had slackened, and he breathed as if he were all at once exhausted beyond control. But the hot fingers held on to mine. ‘They may have gone towards the village—' the thick mutter was still in English – ‘and if you're going that way—'

‘Mark!' Lambis moved forward, crowding me aside. ‘You're losing your mind! Hold your tongue and tell her to go! You want sleep.' He added in Greek: ‘I'll go and look for him myself, as soon as I can, I promise you. He's probably back at the caique; you torture yourself for nothing.' Then to me, angrily: ‘Can't you see he's fainting?'

‘All right,' I said. ‘But don't shout at me like that. I'm not the one that's killing him.' I tucked the now unresponsive hand back under the coat, and stood up to face the Greek. ‘I told you I'm asking no questions, but I am not going away from here and leaving him like this. When did this happen?'

‘The day before last,' sullenly.

‘He's been here two nights?' I said, horrified.

‘Not in here. The first night, he was out on the mountain.' He added, as if defying me to go further: ‘Before I find him and bring him here.'

‘I see. And you've not tried to get help? All right, don't look like that, I've managed to gather that you're in some sort of trouble. Well, I'll keep quiet about it, I promise you. Do you think I
want
to get mixed up in whatever skulduggery you're up to?'

‘Whatever trouble you're in,' I translated impatiently. ‘It's nothing to me. But I told you. I don't intend to walk away and leave him like that. Unless you do something about him – what was his name? Mark?'

‘Yes.'

‘Well, unless something's done about your Mark, here and now, he will die, and that will be something more to worry about. Have you any food?'

‘A little. I had bread, and some cheese—'

‘And fine stuff it looks, too.' There was a polythene mug lying in the dirt beside the bed. It had held wine, and there were flies on the rim. I picked it up.

‘Go and wash this. Bring my bag, and my cardigan. They're where I dropped them when you jumped on me with your beastly knife. There's food there. It's not sickroom stuff, but there's plenty of it, and it's clean. Oh, look, wait a moment, there's a cooking-pot of a sort over there – I suppose the shepherds use it. We ought to have hot water. If you fill it, I can get some wood and stuff together, and we'll get a fire going—'

‘No!' Both men spoke together. Mark's eyes had flown open on the word, and I saw a look flash between them which was, for all Mark's weakness, as electric as a spark jumping across points.

I looked from one to the other in silence. ‘As bad as that?' I said at length, ‘Skulduggery was the word, then. Fallen stones, what nonsense.' I turned to Lambis. ‘What was it, a knife?'

‘A bullet,' he said, not without a certain relish.

‘A
bullet
?'

‘Yes.'

‘Oh.'

‘So you see,' said Lambis, his surliness giving way to a purely human satisfaction, ‘you should have kept away. And when you go, you will say nothing. There is danger, great danger. Where there has been one bullet, there can be another. And if you speak a word in the village of what you have seen today, I shall kill you myself.'

‘Yes, all right.' I spoke impatiently; I was scarcely listening. The look in Mark's face was frightening me to death. ‘But get my bag first, will you? And here, wash this,
and
make sure it's clean.'

I thrust the mug at him, and he took it, like a man in a dream.

‘And hurry up!' I added. He looked from me to the mug, to Mark, to the mug again, then left the hut without a word.

‘Greek,' said Mark faintly from his corner, ‘meets Greek.' There was the faintest definable gleam of amusement in his face, under the pain and exhaustion. ‘You're quite a girl, aren't you? What's your name?'

‘Nicola Ferris. I thought you'd fainted again.'

‘No. I'm pretty tough, you don't have to worry. Have you really got some food?'

‘Yes. Look, is the bullet out? Because if it's not—'

‘It is. It's only a flesh wound. And clean. Really.'

‘If you're sure—' I said doubtfully. ‘Not that I'd know a damned thing about bullet wounds, so if we can't have hot water, I'd better take your word for it, and leave it alone. But you've a temperature, any fool could see that.'

‘Out all night, that's why. Lost a bit of blood . . . and it rained. Be all right soon . . . in a day or two.' Suddenly he moved his head, a movement of the most violent and helpless impatience. I saw the muscles of his face twist, but not – I thought – with pain.

I said feebly: ‘Try not to worry, whatever it is. If you can eat something now, you'll be out of here all the sooner, and believe it or not, I've got a flask of hot coffee. Here's Lambis coming now.'

Lambis had brought all my things, and the newly rinsed mug. I took the cardigan from him, and knelt by the bed again.

‘Put this round you.' Mark made no protest when I took the rough jacket away, and tucked the warm, soft folds of wool round his shoulders. I spread the jacket over his legs. ‘Lambis, there's a flask in the bag. Pour him some coffee, will you? Thanks. Now, can you lift up a bit? Drink this down.'

His teeth chattered against the edge of the mug, and I had to watch to make sure he didn't scald his mouth, so eagerly did he gulp at the hot stuff. I could almost imagine I felt it running, warming and vital, into his body. When he had drunk half of it he stopped, gasping a little, and the shivering seemed to be less.

‘Now, try to eat. That's too thick, Lambis; can you shred the meat up a bit? Break the crust off. Come on, now, can you manage this . . . ?'

Bit by bit he got the food down. He seemed at once ravenously hungry, and reluctant to make the effort to eat. From the former fact I deduced thankfully that he was not yet seriously ill, but that, if he could be got to care and help, he would recover fairly quickly. Lambis stood over us, as if to make sure I didn't slip poison into the coffee.

When Mark had eaten all that could be forced into him, and drunk two mugs of coffee, I helped him lower himself back into the bedding, and tucked the inadequate covers round him once more.

‘Now, go to sleep. Try to relax. If you could sleep, you'd be better in no time.'

He seemed drowsy, but I could see him summoning the effort to speak. ‘Nicola.'

‘What is it?'

‘Lambis told you the truth. It's dangerous. I can't explain. But keep out of it . . . don't want you thinking there's anything you can do. Sweet of you, but . . . there's nothing. Nothing at all. You're not to get mixed up with us . . . Can't allow it.'

‘If I only understood—'

‘I don't understand myself. But . . . my affair. Don't add to it. Please.'

‘All right. I'll keep out. If there's really nothing I can do—'

‘Nothing. You've done plenty.' An attempt at a smile. ‘That coffee saved my life, I'm sure of that. Now go down to the village, and forget us, will you? Not a word to anyone. I mean that. It's vital. I have to trust you.'

‘You can.'

‘Good girl.' Suddenly I realized what his dishevelment and sickness had disguised before; he was very young, not much older, I thought, than myself. Twenty-two? Twenty-three? The drawn look and painfully tightened mouth had hidden the fact of his youth. It was, oddly enough, as he tried to speak with crisp authority that his youth showed through, like flesh through a gap in armour.

He lay back. ‘You'd . . . better be on your way. Thanks again. I'm sorry you got such a fright . . . Lambis, see her down the hill . . . as far as you can . . .'

As far as you dare
 . . . Nobody had said it, but he might just as well have shouted it aloud. Suddenly, out of nowhere, fear jumped at me again, like the shadow dropping across the flowers. I said breathlessly: ‘I don't need a guide. I'll follow the water. Goodbye.'

‘Lambis will see you down.' The edged whisper was still surprisingly authoritative, and Lambis picked up my bag and moved towards me, saying flatly: ‘I will go with you. We go now.'

Mark said ‘Goodbye,' in a voice whose dying fall made it utterly final. I looked back from the doorway, to see that he had shut his eyes and turned away, pulling my cardigan close with a small nestling movement. Either he had forgotten about it, or he valued its comfort too highly to have any intention of returning it.

Something about the movement, about the way he turned his cheek into the white softness, caught at me. He seemed all at once younger even than his years; younger by far than I.

I turned abruptly and left the hut, with Lambis close behind me.

3

When the sun sets, shadows, that showed at noon

But small, appear most long and terrible.

NATHANIEL LEE
:
Oedipus

‘I will go first,' said Lambis.

He shouldered past me without ceremony, then led the way through the flowers towards the spring. I noticed how his head turned from side to side as he walked; he went warily, like a nocturnal beast forced to move in daylight. It was not a comforting impression.

Here was the naiad's pool, and, not far from it, the trail of orchids I had dropped. A few steps further, and we were out of sight of the hut.

‘Lambis,' I said, ‘one moment.'

He turned, reluctantly.

‘I want to talk to you.' I spoke softly, though we could certainly not be heard from the hut. ‘Also—' this hurriedly, at his movement of protest – ‘I'm hungry, and if I don't eat
something
before I set off for Agios Georgios, I shall die in my tracks. You could probably do with a sandwich yourself, if it comes to that?'

‘I am okay.'

‘Well, I'm not,' I said firmly. ‘Let me see that bag. There's tons of stuff here, he's eaten very little. I left the coffee for him, and you'd better keep the oranges and the chocolate, and some of the meat. There: we'll leave those. Surely you can help me eat the rest?'

I thought he hesitated, eyeing the food. I added: ‘I'm going to, anyway. You really needn't see me any further, you know. I'll be quite all right on my own.'

He jerked his head sideways. ‘We cannot stay here, it is too open. There is a place above, where we can see, and not be seen. You can see the hut from there, and the way up to it. This way.'

He slung my bag over his shoulder, turned aside from the pool, and began to clamber up through the rocks, towards the place where I had first caught sight of him. I saw him pause once, glancing about him with that tense, wary look, and his free hand crept, in the gesture I was beginning to know, towards the hilt of his knife. He was coatless, and the wooden hilt, worn smooth with much handling, stuck piratically up from the leather sheath in his trouserbelt.